


This is A War

by PoliticalPadmé (magnetgirl)



Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016), Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Childhood Friends, Eventual Romance, F/F, Force-Sensitive Leia Organa
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-12-30
Updated: 2017-01-11
Packaged: 2018-09-13 07:24:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,878
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9112597
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/magnetgirl/pseuds/PoliticalPadm%C3%A9
Summary: Jyn and Leia through the years





	1. Peers

Jyn was ready to refuse. The Alliance and the Empire were equally terrible from her perspective. Neither had ever done anything but take away her whole family and land her in prison. A reunion with Saw would just bring back memories -- and feelings, likely -- she’d rather leave buried. And for what? To gather more proof her father’s genius was used to build weapons of mass destruction? Drag him before the Senate so he could be executed for treason by one side or the other? She’d rather go back to prison.

But then _he_ stepped out of the dark, their eyes met, and refusal died on her lips.

He looked exactly the same as when she’d last seen him. Tall, imposing, regal. Outwardly determined and ...disappointed. But inwardly, secretly, tired and ...scared. Scared for her? Scared of her? She hadn’t understood it then and she didn’t understand it now. She only knew if she refused to help she’d prove him right about her. Prove he was right to leave her where he found her. She didn’t care about the Empire or the Alliance. She had no family, no friends left. Saw abandoned her, she’d had to give up her father forever ago, everyone in this room stared at her in judgement. She didn’t matter to Bail Organa and Bail Organa certainly didn’t matter to her.

But his daughter…

 

_Twelve Years Earlier_

 

“Leia, come here.”

The Viceroy -- whatever a viceroy is -- called to a girl all in white, her hair pulled into an elaborate collection of braids with silver combs. She looked like something out of a storybook and Jyn felt small and dirty beside her.

“Jyn, this is my daughter, Leia.” Leia gave her a practiced response, something between a bow and a nod, that only made Jyn feel more awkward. “Leia, this is Jyn Erso.”

“Hello,” said Leia warmly. Jyn scowled. The girl was just a year or two younger than her, but she doubted they had anything in common and she didn’t need friends anyway.

“Leia.” Both girls turned at the gruff voice. “I doubt you remember me.”

“Mr. Gerrera,” she countered. As both royal and rebel, Leia was raised to remember names, faces, and histories, and she’d had a strong sense for reading people since birth. Bail and Saw both smiled at her recognition. Jyn’s scowl deepened.

“Saw and I have business to catch up on before the queen joins us for dinner.” Despite their young age, both Leia and Jyn recognized ‘business’ as code for ‘rebellion’. That’s what comes from being born into the dawn of the Empire. “Leia, show Jyn around the palace will you?”

“I’m honored, father.”

Jyn shot Saw a look of disbelief. She couldn’t possibly be expected to ...play? with a pretentious princess. There was an insurrection going on! It had already claimed her parents, she didn’t have time for tea parties.

Saw leaned down to rest a hand on her shoulder and speak quietly to her alone. She hoped to be asked to join them. She expected a platitude. Instead he murmured, “behave yourself.” as if she was a child! A disobedient child!

Jyn whirled around, grabbed Leia’s hand and dragged her away from the two adults. Leia glanced back to see their twin expressions of bemusement and, comforted this was within the realm of appropriate, let go her resistance. Jyn stopped stomping when they crossed a doorway -- and she realized their hands were swinging together instead of Leia trying to pull away. She dropped the princess’s hand and crossed her arms, still scowling down at Leia.

“Would you like to see the gallery?” asked Leia.

“No.” This stupid hallway was already too much art for Jyn’s tastes.

“How about the garden?”

“No,” Jyn said again. A garden would only remind her of the home she left behind months ago. Where her mother died.

“We could go to your room,” Leia suggested. “You could dress for dinner.”

Jyn raised an eyebrow. “What’s wrong with what I’m wearing?”

“Nothing.” Leia shrugged. The Organa family respected all traditions, even if they broke with protocol. Hm. “Would you like to meet a protocol droid?”

Jyn rolled her eyes. “Lots of people have droids.”

“Threepio is fluent in over six million languages,” Leia explained. “He’s very interesting.” Jyn rolled her eyes again. Extra dramatically. It sort of reminded Leia _of_ Threepio but she diplomatically kept that thought to herself. “What would you like to do?”

“I want to be at the meeting, obviously,” Jyn answered haughtily.

“Oh.” Leia pivoted and started walking  -- in the opposite direction her father and Saw had gone. “Follow me.”

“Wha -- where?”

“Well, we can’t very well walk in the door can we?” Leia called back. “Not if we want to hear anything real.”

Jyn stared after the young princess she ...may have misjudged. And then ran to catch up.

Leia stopped at a door that looked identical to the row of nine or so they’d passed. But she hit a hidden switch and a passageway opened in the wall. Jyn’s eyes grew wide despite herself. Saw had said these people were part of the underground resistance just like he was, and her mother had been, but when she saw the palace they lived in she assumed it was for show at best. Now she realized their castle may hide as many secrets as the farm or the bunker. And the girl may know as many tricks as she did.

“Where’s the switch?”

“Here.” Leia touched a stone that to Jyn’s eyes looked the same as all the others. “But it only responds to the royal family,” she added, apology in her voice. Jyn shook her head -- apology wasn’t necessary -- but Leia mistook the gesture and explained further. “Papa, Mama, and me.”

The wall closed behind them as Jyn followed Leia into the hidden passage. “Do you like being a princess?”

“I don’t know.” Leia unhooked two hand torches from the wall, switched them on, and handed one to Jyn. “I’ve always been one so I don’t know what it’s like to be something else.”

Jyn nodded.

“This way.” Leia led her new friend down the small corridor to the alcove behind the portrait of her great great great grandfather or some such that hung in her father’s large study.

“Will you get in trouble for this?” Jyn asked, though it was entirely too late to do anything about it.

“Why?” Leia asked with a grin. “Papa told me to show you the palace.”

The two girls dissolved into silent giggles as they reached their destination -- and heard the adults speaking on the other side of the wall.

“...here to argue.” Saw’s gruff voice frightened Leia, though she’d never tell. It comforted Jyn.

“I know,” Leia’s father answered in the soothing voice she recognized from many such meetings with people who didn’t come to argue yet spent all their time doing so. “And I don’t want to argue. I’m glad you came, brought the girl. It’s good for her -- and Leia, too.”

Saw grunted. “I doubt they have much in common.”

Jyn and Leia glanced at each other. They didn’t really expect to hear the men talk about _them_.

“They have us,” Bail suggested. “They have this…” his voice trailed off but the silence was heavy with sadness.

“War,” supplied Saw.

“...Situation,” countered Bail. It wasn’t a war, yet. Couldn’t be with the odds stacked so much against them -- the Jedi decimated, the army firmly under Palpatine’s control. The rebels were scattered throughout the galaxy, little cells ironically created under Skywalker’s plan. Saw led one of the first, one of the most aggressive, and he had little patience for Bail’s careful plan to build a network, amass a proper fleet, and gather Senate support.

Saw grunted again. “War is all I know.” His voice was softer, tinged with fear. Nothing scared Saw Gerrera -- except a motherless little girl needing him.

“Teach her,” Bail answered, equally soft, equally scared. He knew the war was inevitable, knew Leia was destined to play a part. He couldn’t give her the life he wanted for her, the life of safety, peace, and prosperity she deserved. But he could prepare her for the life she had. He would raise her to be a leader.

And Saw would raise Jyn to be a fighter.

And they would win.

“And love her,” he continued, pride and joy replacing the fear in his voice. “I know you already do.”

Saw’s wordless response was lost to Jyn and Leia but Leia grasped the other girl’s hand in support.

“Her mother deserved better,” Saw said after an uncomfortable silence. Jyn swallowed, touched her free hand to the crystal around her neck.

“Well, that’s something else they have in common,” Bail answered sadly, thinking of his dear friend dying just after Leia was born.

Jyn turned to Leia in confusion.

“My parents died fighting the Empire,” Leia explained. Her brown eyes were wide in the low light. “I was a baby, I don’t remember them.” Not awake, at least. Sometimes she dreamed of a beautiful woman with a kind smile but sad eyes.

“Oh,” said Jyn, and she turned back to the conversation on the other side of the wall to avoid saying anything more.

“...her father?”

“An imperial,” answered Saw, “reluctant. I believe. But dangerous.”

Jyn froze, expecting Leia to pull away in fear, or anger, her own heart pounded in her ears. But Leia only gave her hand another squeeze of quiet support.  

“I understand,” said Bail, hushed and haunted, visions of Vader threatening to overwhelm. Behind the wall Leia frowned, confused by the strong feelings she sensed in her father.

“If they find her, take her...they’ll use her to keep him in line,” Saw murmured, almost as if he hadn’t heard Bail, “I can’t let them find her.”

“What’s your plan?”

Leia gave Jyn a tug. “We should go, they’ll be looking for us soon.”

“Keep moving,” Saw answered. “For now.”

“How do you know?” Jyn stepped quietly behind Leia.

“If there’s any way I can help,” she heard Bail offer before they moved too far away to hear any more.

“I just do.”

Jyn frowned. It was a strange night and Leia was a strange girl.  

But also: Jyn liked her.


	2. Lessons

“Mama doesn’t want me to,” Leia explained, a secret wistfulness in her voice.

“Not ladylike enough?” guessed Jyn. The princess was dressed in pristine white as always, her hair in elaborate spirals, and today with an actual crown tucked into them. In contrast, Jyn was in drab coveralls she’d almost outgrown, her hair was pulled off her face in a messy ponytail and her hands were covered in residue from the blaster.

Leia shot her friend a withering look, one of the best in her arsenal even at barely eleven years old. “My mother is a pacifist,” she explained. “Alderaan has no weapons or soldiers on principle.”

Jyn frowned. Saw would probably laugh in her face, but Saw was a rude old bastard. And actually, he’d always been weirdly respectful of Alderaan’s queen. “Principles can’t save you from an Imperial attack.”

Leia bit her lip. “What’s it like?”

“What?”

“Fighting.”

Jyn looked away, bothered by the intensity of Leia’s gaze. Answers flooded her mind alongside images. The caves were dark. Rough sand got in everything. The waiting felt like the worst -- until the deafening explosions. Until it came time to identify the dead. Saw had tried to shield her from a lot of it, at first, but she reminded him she’d already seen her mother shot dead. What could be worse than that?

A lot of things, actually. Lyra had died cleanly, swiftly, just fell over in the grass. Jyn still heard the sound. The officer's voice, the blasters, her father’s cry. The thump as her mother’s body hit the ground was impossibly loudest of all.

But the explosions were worse. Knowing she’d helped make the bombs... She was good at it, one of the best. Small hands and a sharp mind make the task go quickly. But they never blew up the dark colored Death Troopers of her nightmares. Instead it was the bright white Stormtroopers who had protected her family when she was small. She’d had a doll of one. But they weren’t dolls, they were people. Dead people because of her. Saw said they chose to work for the Empire so they were the enemy and not worth talking to. Not worth worrying over. Not worth saving.

But what did that mean for her father?

Leia was still watching, waiting for an answer to her stupid, naive question. Part of Jyn wanted to tell her all of it. Maybe it would scare her into staying in her pacifist bubble, at least when she died her soul would be intact. Or maybe the truth would have the opposite effect, would turn her into a weapon herself. Jyn didn’t know which was the right or good outcome.

“Loud,” she answered, finally. Ironically speaking barely above a whisper.

Leia brushed gentle fingers across Jyn’s palm. “Does it hurt?” she asked, just as softly. “When you pull the trigger?”

“Yeah.” Jyn pulled her hand away from the princess. “But not as much as being blasted would.”

Leia folded her hands behind her back, falling into the stance of a tiny diplomat with such practiced ease it seemed entirely natural. “The Empire is not peaceful. So the Rebellion needs fighters.”

“The Rebellion needs a lot of things,” Jyn muttered. She didn’t want Leia’s -- or anyone’s -- assurance or approval. She didn’t want to talk about this at all. “Do you wanna learn or not?”

Leia stared at the blaster in Jyn’s hands. It was smaller than the ones she’d seen, mostly in the hands of stormtroopers, but sometimes rebels or even her father. He was culturally and philosophically a pacifist, too, but in practice he was practical.

Sometimes Leia worried there was something wrong with her. She wanted to fight back. Her mother’s faith in peace never wavered, at least not that Leia had ever seen or felt. Her father was committed to the Rebellion, had seen the Emperor and his Empire do too much damage not to do everything he could to stop them, to destroy them. But what that meant, what he had to be a party to. . . it was destroying him, too. Beneath his determination and dedication to the cause, Leia often sensed his shame.

Leia didn’t feel serenity or shame. Leia felt anger. Anger at the Empire that loomed large and menacing over everything and everyone in her life. Anger at the rebels who accused her father of being too diplomatic or too aggressive, often at the same time. Anger at all the rules that come with being in the public eye, with being a princess, and a politician’s daughter, a politician of sorts herself. Sometimes she was angry at the mountains. Sometimes she was angry at her parents. Or the droids. Or the stars. Sometimes she was angry at the anger.

Leia sensed the same anger in Jyn.

She touched the blaster, curled her fingers around the handle. It was smaller than the ones she’d seen but still big in her hand. Her fingers tightened as she nodded with resolve.

“I want to.” She raised her eyes to the older girl’s. “Yes.”

Saw Gerrera grunted from his perch behind the wall, hidden from the children. “You were right,” he conceded at Bail’s questioning glance. Saw had assumed the little princess might play act at being a rebel, but shy away from a real blaster, the promise of a real fight. He’d laughed at the suggestion Jyn teach her. But as his protege launched into the same lecture he’d given her as an introduction to handheld pulse weapons, Leia listened with an intensity he rarely saw even in his own recruits.

“A thousand years ago, before the Houses were united under the mantle of peace, one of Alderaan’s many factions was ruled by a warrior queen. Eksa.” Bail spoke softly, eyes remaining on the two girls below. “Today she’s legend, a popular folklore. She refused to lay down arms, or so the story goes, because ‘someone must remember how to fight for peace’. She lived to be over a hundred, was buried with her crystal lance, never having given in.”

As they watched Jyn set up a shot for Leia, explaining each action in detail, before finally stepping behind the smaller girl, one hand pressed against the small of her back to lend support. Leia took a breath, squared her shoulders, and squeezed the trigger. A bright blue beam lanced out of the blaster and hit the energy shield they'd erected around the room, both as target and safety. The blast was absorbed instantly.

“It’s said every generation one girl inherits Eksa’s mandate.”

Saw grunted again, but not unkindly.

Leia stared at her hands, at the dusting of silver particles from the blaster’s core, practically invisible to the eye, but with her heightened senses she could feel it even after the single shot.

Jyn frowned at Leia’s stillness. “Are you ...hurt?”

Leia shook her head, brushed her hands together twice, and raised her eyes to meet Jyn’s. “Show me how to control my aim.”


End file.
